Just in case anyone thought the Rapid City Journal was being too conservative lately, a little religious/Republican bashing from Sam Hurst

In Sunday's Rapid City Journal, Columnist Sam Hurst showed his versatility by managing to insult newly elected District 32 Republican Senate Candidate Elli Schwiesow and all Republicans at the same time he bashes Evangelical Christians:

The problem for Evangelical Republicans is that their program is so absolute, so rigidly intolerant, that they have no way to move to the center without moving away from God, and their God isn't some namby-pamby, "Sermon on the Mount" liberal ... some mushy, "love-thy-neighbor" God. Theirs is a vengeful God, and he's coming after us sinners ... hardly a message designed to attract the middle.

Imagine Elli Schwiesow at a candidate's forum in the upcoming months. Question from the audience: "Elli. Do you believe that the Bible is the word of God?" "Well, yes."

"Then you believe that we should follow the command of God in Leviticus 20:13 and kill all homosexuals? I mean, it's a direct quote from God to Moses ... can't get any more straight forward than that. And then there's Leviticus 20:10 - kill all the adulterers."

What can Elli say? "The Bible isn't the word of God." Or "As a state legislator I'm going to change the word of God. I'm willing to settle for just banning gay marriage."

and...

If recent polls are anywhere close to the mood of the people, there are thousands and thousands of Republicans across the state who woke up in shock the morning after the primary. But where can they go?

If the SDWC can serve as your comfort food for this morning, let me assure you, it's ok to go to church, hold religious values, and participate as a Republican. It's also ok to hold more moderate or no religious positions and be a Republican. It's a big party.

The key is, to understand that as in any organization, the majority is going to rule. And in South Dakota, the majority of consistent voters go to church. Don't like it? Then recruit more people of with your own belief structure to participate. That's how it works.

And send a letter to the editor at the Rapid City Journal at letters@rapidcityjournal.com to let them know how tiresome all the religion bashing is getting.

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Anonymous said…

What ever happened to protecting the rights of the minority? I guess mob rule is the new Republican platform.

“It's also ok to hold more moderate or no religious positions and be a Republican. It's a big party.”

No…..you’ve made it very clear that it is not OK to be a moderate Republican. That is almost all we’ve seen on this site for the last 2 weeks. Maybe what you meant to say was that it is OK to be a moderate Republican as long as you don’t have the audacity to run for office as one. Just sit in the back of the room and vote for the conservatives because you live in South Dakota and you don’t have any other choice.

The problem, PP, is that there are a lot -- and I mean A LOT -- of people that go to church every week, myself included, who are sick and tired of the wackos on the right fringe defining Christianity in a hateful way.

They are giving my faith a bad name by illustrating it to the unbelieiving as intolerant and hateful.

Are we supposed to just sit idle and let them get away with it? We've done that for too long and all that has resulted is more and more intolerance.

We're speaking up and showing the world just how wacky the right-wing fringe really is.

Chad, it's the libs/lefties, whatever you want to call them, that in the name of tolerance for anything and everything, are the most intolerant of pretty much only Christianity or things patriotic. Care to explain that?

PP, Sam's obvious bigotry against evangelicals has become a staple of the RCJ's opinion page every other Sunday. Gotta have balance against Alan Aker, ya know:)

One does get the impression that Sam Hurst, and Chad as well, got picked on in high school by a bunch of Jesus freaks. Both are now using the media/blogosphere to lash back at their alleged tormentors.

Yes there is one Democrat who contributes regularly. But Apa and Tsitrian aren't exactly moderates. It's just not good enough for you to have a majority, is it? You need to have every say exactly what you want to hear, all the time.

Or then there was this a couple days ago, where the RCJ talks about how the financial reporting process is flawed and mentioned a bill from this last session that would have changed the law. They just left out the little bitty fact that all the Democrats voted to change the law and all the Republicans voted to keep the law the same.

You've got a right wing rag in your pocket and it has one guy who writes once a week and everyone knows is a pretty liberal guy--who in this case is stating the obvious fact that the religious fundamentalists turned out and won the primaries for the right wing of the SD GOP--and it's just not enough for you. And it won't be until every major newpaper, radio and television broadcast is lockstep with your agenda.

I will say this for the RCJ and its editorial board, though: The RCJ is arguably the only newspaper in SD, and possibly the Great Plains/Intermountain West, that, for good or ill, "knows which side its bread is buttered on." Witness its editorial rants against pork-barrel spending, on one hand, and its editorial raves for the unneeded Neutrino lab, on the other hand.

I live on the Colorado Front Range, and I can assure you that no metro Denver paper behaves in this manner.

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